Several harried passengers of the Kingfisher Airlines flight to Mumbai who had refused to board the aircraft after it was delayed without any information today claimed the airline did not pay them the compensation it had promised.

Kingfisher had on Monday offered a written apology to the 50-odd passengers of the IT-338 Delhi-Mumbai flight when its departure got delayed by 40 minutes. The airline,

according to the passengers, had promised to compensate them the taxi fare from Mumbai airport.

The flight landed at Mumbai past midnight. On Tuesday, several passengers told Newsline that they were not given the conveyance promised to them by the airline. Some, though, managed to get the taxi fare from the airline’s officials but after heated arguments.

A Kingfisher spokesperson said the flight was to arrive in Delhi from Lucknow at 7.50 pm but was delayed by 20 minutes due to air traffic congestion. It landed at the airport’s new runway, 29-11, at 8.20 pm. “It takes at least 20 minutes from the new runway for an aircraft to reach domestic terminal through the taxi way,” a Kingfisher official said. “The passengers were asked to board the flight at 8.40 pm but some them refused to board in protest.”

In a letter to the passengers, the airline’s airport manager, who was present at the time, had apologised and assured that “guests will be provided transport at Mumbai upon arrival. The lack of communication will be investigated.”

Today, one passenger said from Mumbai: “We checked with at least four officials at the airport but they said they had no information about the transport facility promised to passengers in Delhi. I had to pay the taxi fare.”

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